Time series graph of 2019-nCoV vs. SARS 2003 vs. Swine Flu 2009, switchable between 45-day and 100-day plots, and linear/log scale for the y-axis. I presume it's updated once a day, as are the other data souces thus far.

But to keep things in perspective it is miniscule compared to the 7.7 G population of the world or even the millions in the epicenter city.

To use an alternate perspective I deployed in the Science News thread discussion about the Coronavirus epidemic, the half-dozen atoms fissioned by the implosion-triggered neutron source at the heart of the fission core of a nuclear bomb is miniscule compared to the roughly 2^85 atoms of U235 or Pu239 contained in the core. Nonetheless, within a few microseconds a significant fraction of the 2^85 atoms have fissioned, resulting in a nuclear blast which can level a city. The branching ratios for both the fission chain reaction and the Coronavirus spreading appear to be similar, between 2 and 3. The crucial question is, will the usual obstacles to regional epidemics turning into global pandemics - geographic/climate barriers, viral mutation to less-harmful strain, emergency public health measures, crach-course-developed vaccines - work in the present case? The rapidity with which the virus spread across all of China and now elsewhere is deeply worrisome.

And a must-read re. the race against the clock by scientists in China which identified the novel-human-pathogen aspect of the outbreak, and the ensuing "what the government did with this information":

The period from December 8 to December 31 was a crucial 23-day period. During this time, scientists in China were not in fact idle, but raced against the clock trying to trace the virus – and their performance was remarkable. Meng Xin (孟昕), a researcher at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, has since disclosed:

So originally they [NOTE: Meng is referring here to the government] had one ace card in their hand. My colleagues worked hard through the night, and within one week had managed to: successfully isolate the disease, sequence the coronavirus genome (测完了序列), and confirmed the origin of the disease. In less than two weeks, they had developed test reagents and had distributed them to provincial CDCs, and they had reviewed anywhere from dozens to hundreds of specimens from Wuhan (the specific number is still unknown), actions that would earn unanimous praise from international colleagues and the World Health Organization, and that would save precious time in the prevention and control of the epidemic.

Meng is referring here specifically to the actions taken by scientists in Beijing. But Shanghai scientists were not far behind. According to a report in Health News (健康报), the official publication of China’s National Health Commission, the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center (上海市公共卫生临床中心) had isolated a new strain of coronavirus by January 5, within just 10 days of its receiving samples from patients in Wuhan on December 26, and scientists at the center had obtained the entire genome sequence.

On January 11, on the basis of the latest research developments in Beijing and Shanghai, China officially confirmed that this new coronavirus was the pathogen causing the Wuhan pneumonia epidemic, and it shared the new coronavirus gene sequence information with the WHO.

But while the Chinese authorities informed the World Health Organization about these developments at the earliest opportunity, they did not inform their own people...

Time series graph of 2019-nCoV vs. SARS 2003 vs. Swine Flu 2009, switchable between 45-day and 100-day plots, and linear/log scale for the y-axis. I presume it's updated once a day, as are the other data souces thus far.

As awful as that "Deaths" graph looks, there seems to be a consensus among some experts and other intelligent people that a more deadly virus will have to stabilise faster since it will destroy it's means of propagation more effectively.

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